He Said, She Said: Death Race 2000

WordGirl and I typically wage "He Said, She Said" battles through the comments on the initial post, but since the Blogathon makes that difficult, we'll just trade posts.

WordGirl and I recently attended a special screening of cinema classic "Death Race 2000", a bold social satire featuring a pre-"Rocky" Sly Stallone and a post-"Kung Fu" David Carradine as dueling racers in the brutal cross-country sport of hit-and-run.

Oh, WordGirl will likely take exception to the prevalence of over-the-top fashion, over-the-top performances, and no-top-at-all displays of bosoms, but to harp on these elements of an otherwise breathtaking film is simply gratuitous criticism.

Sure, there are cyborgs, Nazis, and scenes of violence which might well be considered graphic were they not shown so quickly as to hide the fact that the special effects department was apparently outsourced to the local elementary school's Science Fair.

But what other movie of the era so presciently predicted:

1. America's self-destructive obsession with being on TV, such as when the girl dressed like one of Manos' handmaidens boldly stands in the road to be run down by Frankenstein's car in an act of sacrifice at least as noble as Hillary baking cookies during Bill's scandals

2. The appeal of massage therapy

3. A 24-hour sports network

4. The emergence of China as a world power

5. Pimping rides

Clearly, the pre-"Star Wars" period of 70s sci-fi wasn't all bad.

Was it?